It's Okay
by writerofthelord
Summary: After the season 8 finale, Crowley feels a strong need for forgiveness. But how could he, the King of Hell, ever be forgiven? He finds out when he meets Lou, an eight year old kid who likes him just as much as everyone else in the world dislikes him.


The church was very old and it was in Scotland, and Crowley felt so much older when he stood on the steps. Everything was stone. Bricks. The doors alone were wood. Warm brown wood that reminded Crowley of the cabins he sometimes saw in America. Seeing those doors, all he could think of was that boy, Tommy Collins. The one who'd gone camping, twice, and died, once.

He shivered, looking up at those doors. He felt as if the world was closing in on him.

He was, after all, a demon. Crossroads at first, promoted to King of Hell when no one else was up to it. Crowley found himself grateful, knowing that the job was no longer his. Abaddon would be guilty now. She would kill. She would hurt. Crowley just needed to step through those doors and it could all be ended.

When he was still a Scotsman, hundreds of years ago, he'd gone to a church like this one. The gray stones had intimidated him. They were dark, cold. He'd stared up at them with narrowed eyes, imagining the stones falling apart and toppling onto him. At the time, the image had horrified him. Recently, though, he could imagine himself causing that, and that image was far more horrifying.

"It's a lot nicer on the inside."

Crowley flinched. The voice, it was a high one. It sounded like a bell. Not the kind of bell that hung in a church tower. The kind you rang to give angels wings. How ironic, he thought.

He looked down and raised an eyebrow. There at his side was a little girl, dressed in the puffiest coat he'd ever seen. An oversized beret covered her scraggly hair, falling over her eyes, but he could still see how bright they were, how they stared up at him and did not look away.

"Sorry, who are you?" he asked, taking a step back. The last time he'd interacted with a child, it had been an attempt to kill him. He could feel the temptation already. His hands tingled with power. It stole through his bones, craving every part of him.

The girl didn't seem to notice his distress. She kept smiling. "My mum says not to talk to strangers. But everyone's a stranger at the start, so I'll tell you, anyways. My name is Lou."

"Lou," the demon repeated.

"That's right."

"What are you doing here, Lou?" Crowley asked, cautiously. Every instinct was telling him that this could be a fallen angel, some poor pigeon who'd had the misfortune of gaining a child vessel.

She kept talking, though. "Well, see, I got in a fight with my brother, and I broke some of his things and called him some mean names, and my mom told me I had to come here for confession." And the words seemed real, every bit of them.

"It's nicer on the inside, you say?" he asked, glancing back at the church. Lou nodded. "I think I'll go in with you, then."

It was nicer, as the girl had claimed, but Crowley still felt a strange sense of loss when he stepped through the doors. He felt lost and found all at once. As if he didn't belong there and yet, something was trying to help him belong.

Lou, of course, was certainly trying her hardest. She held the demon's hand in hers, ignoring the way he completely dwarfed her, ignoring the way that Crowley's tie was stained with blood and the bruises all along his face. He hadn't bothered to clean himself after his time with Sam. He wanted to remember every bit of it.

He wanted to remember the church, as well.

The walls were decorated with stained glass windows, all shades of colors flickering into the room. Unlike the last church Crowley had been in, this one still had the pews. Rows and rows of them, stretching all the way up to the altar. He felt the urge to sit in one, to sit there the way angels might seek revelation. Briefly, he wondered how many fallen angels had wandered into a church, confused and unsure, knowing only of their missing Father and siblings.

They must all have been filled with strangers, all over the world. The media would call it a religious revival. The angels would call it homesickness.

"The confession room is back there," Lou said, interrupting the demon's thoughts. She pointed to the end of the room. Well, she tried to, at least. Her sleeve was too long; it overlapped her hand. Crowley could only see the very tips of her fingers, pale and numb from the cold.

"Where's the priest?"

Lou shrugged, still dragging the man along with her. "He's not here, I don't think. I think he's at the hospital, visiting patients. He does that a lot. He used to visit my dad before he died."

"I'm sorry," Crowley said, and he was surprised to find warmth seeping through the girl's icy fingers.

"It's alright," she said, smiling up at him. "We can confess to each other, okay? I promise I'll be nice."

And he was laughing, then. Not at a cruel joke, the murder of an innocent, a battle he'd won. There Crowley was, once the ruler of Hell, now trudging through an old church with a small girl who had already deemed him a friend of hers. He wondered how it had happened.

They wandered into the confessional and sat down across from each other.

Lou peeled off her coat. She struggled a bit, trying to tug off the sleeves, and on instinct, Crowley reached out to pull her free. "Thanks," she said, and reached out to do the same for him. "Your coat is too fancy," she scolded.

Crowley looked down in wonder, finding his silk jacket on the floor beside his seat. "I suppose it is."

"My mom would like it. She always makes me dress up for church. She'd like you."

"You think so, do you?"

The girl nodded, her hair bouncing against her neck. "Oh, yeah, really, I do. Now come on. Let's confess. I'll go first, if you want?"

Glancing around the room, Crowley searched for watching eyes. He could find none but Lou's. "All right," he said. He leaned back and waited for the kid to begin.

Lou closed her eyes and folded her hands in her lap. "In the name of the Father, the Son, and Holy Spirit," she started, doing the sign of the cross quickly and expertly. Crowley found himself mimicking the movements, hoping he wouldn't mess up when it was his turn. "My last confession was a month ago."

Crowley's eyes widened. "A month ago? How often do you sin, kid?"

She poked open one eye. "Not too much. But I get real worried so I come here a lot. Sometimes I talk to the priests and sometimes I confess and I always feel real better when I leave." She closed her eye again. " Now ssh, I've got to keep going."

"Ah. I see. Sorry."

Lou smiled. "Anyways. I haven't been very nice to my little brother, Toby. I keep saying mean things to him. He always cries. I don't want to make him cry. I feel real bad about that. Also, sometimes I take his stuff. And sometimes I break it. Even when it's his favorite. So I feel bad about that, too." She paused, tapping her fingers on her legs. "Um . . . I didn't do my homework a couple of times. And I didn't finish eating my supper and I lied about why. I said I wasn't hungry. I just really didn't like my mom's soup."

Crowley couldn't help but laugh a little. He knew, though, that his time was coming soon. He'd have to say everything, all he'd done, and he had to say it to this kid who probably didn't know most of those things were possible.

"Also, I'm talking to a stranger. But he's not really a stranger anymore. I like him. I still don't know his name, though."

"It's Crowley."

"Okay, his name is Crowley. So I guess maybe he isn't a stranger anymore. But he was at first. And I'm not supposed to do that. So that's bad." Lou paused again. "Um . . . I think that's it? I don't know. There's probably more but I can't remember." She opened her eyes. "Okay, I'm done now. You've got to say something."

Crowley blinked. "Like what?"

Lou shrugged. "Something to do with forgiving, I guess. I don't really know."

"Well, if it doesn't particularly matter, then, I forgive you."

They sat there for a few moments, glancing around at the confessional, eyes always coming back to each other. "Good," Lou finally said. "I'm forgiven now." She smiled. "It's your turn, Crowley."

He nodded and pressed his back into the chair. He could feel Lou's eyes on him, even with his own closed, and he could hear her fingers tapping again. He had to begin. But where? Where could he ever begin? Even before becoming a demon, he'd sinned, and he hadn't apologized for those yet. He winced, imagining what Lou would think of him when he was finished. He said the Holy Trinity and began. "My last confession was hundreds of years ago."

Across from him, he could hear Lou giggling. "You exaggerate, just like Dad used to do."

Crowley flinched. It would be so much harder to be forgiven, now, he knew. Hundreds of years of the worst kinds of sins, and the kid didn't even realize. "I hurt my son," he said. "I did not treat him very well, not the way a father should. I probably exaggerated far too much with him, to be honest. And then I lost him. That boy died and we never made up." He grimaced, remembering the ghost of his son, how empty he had looked. The coldness in his eyes.

"Sorry," Lou whispered.

"It's alright," the demon said, relaxing at the sound of her voice. "I made some deals. Deals for petty reasons, which I regret. I then began to hurt people. I hurt many, many people." If he thought hard enough, he could recall his first kill. A young mother. He'd tortured her in front of her own children. They cried. He'd laughed. "I killed some people, too. Probably killed more than I hurt." He drew in a breath and leaned back his head. "Some people, you know, they depend quite a lot on each other. And when you hurt the ones they care about, the ones they love, that just about kills them, too."

"Even when they're not dead?"

"Even when they're not dead."

He froze, feeling a small hand wrap around his own. He felt so small, then. He felt as if he was a child, just a boy, wanting so hard to do something, but not quite sure what to do. Lou's hand on his was warm and comforting. It was there, it was not leaving.

"Thanks, kid," he sighed, opening his eyes just a crack. Lou nodded at him. "There's a lot of bad things I've done, and I hope you'll never have to see, and I quite honestly believe it's a miracle that you're actually listening to me right now. I don't want you to hear more."

"I've got to hear more, Crowley."

They stared at each other for a few more moments, hands still firm in each other's grasps, and then Crowley continued. He told stories of torture. People he'd kept captive. Demons he'd punished. He told of how he'd chained them up, burned their skin. Worst of all were the stories he told them, stories of hope and redemption, of better futures. Stories of their families, still living on, and stories of how they'd be ruined, too.

He told of how he'd lied, how he'd cheated so many people. "You'd probably like Castiel quite a lot," he said, chuckling. The image in his head, an angel so lost and desperate, just what he needed to prey on, while the angel had no one to pray to. He'd told so many people he would help them, only to turn on their backs, laugh as the fear came into their eyes, as they realized the truth of what was coming.

Crowley couldn't stop thinking about that boy, Tommy Collins, and the other survivors who he'd killed. Sara Blake. Jenny Craig. Reading those novels, the ones about the Winchesters and their lives, he'd seen every bit of them. He caught glimpses into their minds. He saw what they lived for, all they had. It was those survivors. Those people with their own lives, seemingly so small and yet, so significant. He'd torn them all apart, and the Winchesters died with them.

"Do you feel bad, Crowley?" Lou asked, after all had been said and done.

He'd been sitting there, very still, one hand still in Lou's. They'd been quiet for a while. Lou had said not one word, letting Crowley wipe his eyes, even though they weren't watering. She had to speak eventually, though, and Crowley knew he had to respond.

"I feel as if I've lived a wasted life," he said, voice heavy with exhaustion. "I feel like I've done the worst things possible."

"Well, I forgive you."

The man's eyes widened. "Sorry, repeat that for me?"

Lou's lips twitched. "I forgive you, Crowley."

He realized he was shaking. Lou's hand vibrated under his shivering fingers. "I don't understand."

Rather than release her hand, Lou moved her other forward, so that both her hands were wrapped around Crowley's. "My mum always tells me that God is very nice. She says that He doesn't expect you to be perfect or anything. You're supposed to be messing up. But He still loves you, anyways, and if you feel real bad, and if you want to make things better, then He'll understand and He'll forgive you."

Crowley stared down at the two small hands. He felt as if he'd been embraced by everyone he'd ever hurt or killed. "You didn't mind hearing all that, did you, Lou?" he asked, suddenly curious.

"Nah. I hear a lot worse at home."

And at that, Crowley burst into laughter. He fell forwards, hunched over his knees, tears falling from his eyes as he tried to regain his breath. "Come here, come here," he managed to choke out, and he pulled Lou towards him, wrapping her in a hug. They sat there, holding each other, whispering, "It's okay, it's okay," and fully believing it.


End file.
